a job and hasn’t been in any trouble. From what I’ve seen, he respects River.”
“Doesn’t matter. No one is dating my girl. She’s too young and—”
“And you’re full of shit.”
I was getting whiplash from all the new voices entering the conversation. Aunt Kelli squeezed between her husband and me, getting in his face as he’d gotten in mine. Reaching behind her, she pushed at my chest with one hand, silently telling me to back up. “River is eighteen today, you idiot. Eighteen. That makes her an adult. She can do whatever the fuck she wants. If she wants to date Maverick, she can, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. The boy had enough respect for you to ask for your blessing, and you turned into a dick.”
“She’s just a little girl,” he argued, his face turning an even darker red, making me wonder how high his blood pressure was at that moment. “River is still in high school.”
“She graduates in little more than a month,” she yelled at him. “Would you stop for two seconds and just look around you? Our daughter is all grown up, Colt. She’s not a baby anymore. This party only proved to me that you haven’t faced the reality that she’s an adult now.” She lifted her hand, waving it at the banner hanging from the ceiling then at what was left of the pink cake. “You told me to let you take care of the party, and look at what you did. This is the same exact setup we had at her eighth birthday. Even that ugly pink cake.”
“She loves pink!”
Kelli stopped and inhaled sharply. “Does she?”
“It’s her favorite color,” he grumbled.
“Dude, it’s blue,” my dad muttered from behind him.
Some of the reddish-purple color drained from Colt’s face, and he turned his head to gape at the enforcer. “No, it’s not.”
Dad only glared at him. “She’s not even my kid, and I know her favorite color is blue. And I know caramel is her least-favorite cake flavor, but you picked that for her birthday cake.”
“You spend too much time with her,” he snapped. “She can’t work at your place anymore.”
“Why? Because I know her better than you?” He shifted my nephew in his arms, looking down at the other man with disgust. “She’s eighteen. If she wants to keep working for me, she can and will. Just because you don’t know shit about your own kid doesn’t mean I have to fire her.”
I felt River before she even touched me. Her hands trembled as she wrapped her arms around me from behind, her face pressing into the center of my back as she inhaled deeply. I stroked my hands over her bare arms, soothing myself with the feel of her beneath my fingertips. Being away from her the last few days had been agony. I’d been on runs in the past that had taken longer, but she hadn’t been pregnant then.
There had been an urgency in me, screaming at me to get back so I could protect my woman and baby.
I ached to pull her around in front of me, kiss the hell out of her, and mark her as mine right there in front of her father. My instinct to protect her, however, had me keeping her behind me.
“You don’t know her better than me,” Colt raged at my father as he turned fully to face him. From the look on Colt’s face, I knew if Dad hadn’t been holding Ian, Colt would have probably punched him. “She’s my little girl. If I say she can’t work for you anymore, then she won’t. And she sure as fuck won’t be dating your worthless son.”
Behind me, I heard River gasp at the same time my mom and both of my sisters started shouting.
“Stop it!” River’s cry drowned out whatever they said. She started to pull away, but I tightened my hold on her. Sighing, she kissed my back then tugged herself free before walking around me to face her father. Colt glared at her, but she marched up to him fearlessly. “Maverick is not worthless, and I’m not going to stand around and let you talk about him like that. I love him, Dad. With everything in me, I love him. And I will be dating him. You have no say in it. Just like you have no say in where I work. As of today, I’m an adult, and I get to make my own decisions regarding my